New Spots Raise Old Tootsie Pop Question

Candy Company Updates Nostalgic Campaign

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Tootsie Roll is finding the answer for its decades-old question as elusive as ever. The latest Tootsie Pop campaign revisits the question of how many licks it takes to get to the center, but still provides no answer.
How many licks does it take? Tootsie Roll still isn't telling.
In 1970 an inquisitive young boy set out to seek the help of Mr. Turtle and Mr. Owl in determining the number of licks it takes to get to the "Tootsie Roll center of a Tootsie Pop." Because biting the Pop proved too irresistible, the characters never found out.

An epic tale
That epic tale is being reprised in a spot from the Harleysville, Pa.-based BC Group featuring a modernized cast of 3-D animated characters.

It is no surprise that Tootsie Roll Industries would play off the popular campaign, which over time has sparked the imagination of countless consumers -- and even scientists. Tootsie.com notes that at least three scientific studies have attempted to determine how many licks it actually takes to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop. Among them are an engineering study at Purdue in which a licking machine modeled after a human tongue averaged 364 licks and human volunteers averaged 252. A University of Michigan study using a similar machine averaged 411 licks.

Tootsie Roll spent roughly $1 million in measured media from January through September of this year, according to TNS Media Intelligence.